So often a man believes what he wishes to believe, and Anthony Durrell was no less prejudiced in this respect than the most ignorant of his neighbours. Jasper Benham's coming to Stonehanger threatened all manner of complications, and was a menace to Durrell's schemings. De Rothan's lies were exceedingly opportune and suggestive. They had worked upon Durrell's austere and Puritanical nature, and his severity never doubted its devotion. This young man was a danger, not only to Nance, but to all his secret understanding with the French.
Durrell returned to the house and found Nance busy in the parlour. She had spread a new cloth and brought out the best china. Her father, alive to these details now that they were of some significance, noticed her rose-flowered gown and an old pearl necklace she was wearing.
"That is not stuff for the day's work, Nance."
"What, father?"
"That dress. Go and change it."
"But, father, breakfast is ready, and Mr. Benham——"
"Mr. Benham has gone, child."
"Gone?"
"Yes. There will be no setting of caps this morning."
Nance flushed with surprise and resentment, for to youth sarcasm is the most hateful of all the methods of coercion, especially when it is petty and unjust.
"You should not speak to me like that, father."
"What? Am I to choose my own words to please a foolish child? I shall have more to say to you on this matter presently."
Nance was humiliated, hurt, and angry. To generous and sensitive natures cynicism seems a vulgar, shallow thing, like a coarse lout mocking at what he does not understand. Nance went to her room and changed her flowered gown for an old stuff dress. Her father had begun breakfast when she returned. He had a book open beside his plate, and he seemed absorbed in it, and disinclined to notice the girl.
Nance watched him, and her pride rose in revolt. Her father had spoken vulgar words, and thrown a contemptible accusation in her face. What shame was there in her discovering pleasure in the pleasure with which she inspired a man? She liked Jasper Benham, trusted him, and felt that her instincts were not at fault. Was her life so full of sympathy that she should be forbidden to make friends?
Yet for the while she said nothing to Anthony Durrell. His face was the colour of the pages of his book. And for once Nance noticed how narrow, thin, and harsh he looked.
She could not help remembering the night when he had brought some strange man secretly to the house, and the thought of his secretiveness and his dry reserve made her impatient. If he was to be tyrannical and unsympathetic, had she not a right to be trusted? She was living this lonely life for his sake, and yet when youth came to share with her the glamour of a spring morning, he raised forbidding hands.
Nance looked at her father, and felt compelled to speak to him.
"Why did you send Mr. Benham away?"
Durrell pushed the book aside.
"Do not catch at conclusions, child."
Nance was not to be put aside so easily.
"Then, why did he go?"
"Possibly because of something I said to him."
"What did you say to him?"
"Nance, I am not minded to be cross-questioned by my child."
She flushed, and showed a frank impatience.
"Am I to have no friends? What harm is there? You know, father, it is dangerous, sometimes, to try and smother all that is in us."
Durrell glanced at her sharply. He was man enough to be struck by the undeniable truth that challenged him out of the mouth of this young girl.
"Nance, what I do I do because it is right."
"But, have I no right to know?"
His face hardened.
"Very well, you shall know. I sent Mr. Benham away because he is not the man I would admit into my house."
"But why?"
"Nance, you have seen very little of the world of men. This young man is of bad repute. He is without honour, without morality."
Nance sat very straight in her chair, her hands moving restlessly in her lap.
"You mean to say, father——?"
"This Jasper Benham is a young man who lives a bad life. He is engaged to marry his cousin, a Miss Benham. That has not prevented him from dishonouring——"
Nance had gone very white. Her eyes were the eyes of one who recoils from something with sudden disgust.
"Father!"
"I tell you this for your own good, child. What do you know of Mr. Jasper Benham? Nothing save that he seemed grateful to you—because you were good to him, that he has a plausible tongue and an assumption of honesty."
She sat rigid, staring at the opposite wall.
"Who told you this?"
"Does that alter the truth? I will not have this young man in my house. He shall work no treachery here."
Nance was dumb. Something seemed to have been taken from life. The breath of the morning was tainted.
Durrell looked at her, not unkindly.
"Now you can understand me, child. I have seen something of the world. I do not want you to suffer pain."
Nance tried to finish her meal, but she had no heart for it, and soon left the table. She wanted to be alone, to set her little world in order. Something had jarred it into momentary confusion. Yet surely it was foolish that she should care at all.
Nance went to her room and saw the flowered gown lying across a chair. The sight of it woke a rush of anger in her. Was he that kind of man? Had he thought her a vain fool who would dance to his piping?
A voice within her cried out in denial:
"An hour ago you trusted him! Are these things true?"
A second voice replied:
"Even if they are true, what does it matter to you? You have seen the man only three times."
She put the dress away, and looked at herself haughtily in the mirror. What manner of woman was she to be so moved by a breath of scandal? If true—well—there was an end of it. She would neither bend her head to listen, nor open her mouth to speak. She had enough pride to carry her past such an incident that had been enlarged by her own loneliness, and touched with the delight of youth and of spring.
Nance had work to keep her busy, though old David Barfoot took the heavy jobs, and washed the crockery, and scrubbed the floors. At the midday meal Nance and her father hardly spoke. She meant to spend the afternoon in her piece of garden upon the terrace, planting out a few seedlings and plucking up assertive weeds. David had promised to come round with his scythe and cut the grass that was growing rank and long.
But though her hands were busy, Nance could not win her thoughts away from the revelation of the morning. She felt sore, mistrustful, incredulous. What did she know of Jasper Benham? Was it true that he was pledged to marry his cousin? She, Nance, had spoken of friendliness. Perhaps he had thought of nothing but friendliness? Her heart told her that it was not so.
Anthony Durrell came out with a book in his hand, and began to pace up and down the terrace. Sometimes he would break out into declamation, waving the book, and throwing his head back like an orator sending words to a distance.
Nance planted her seedlings one by one, kneeling on an old sack, her head bowed over the brown soil.
"Salve, Domine. How go the elegiacs?"
Nance looked up with a start. It was another voice, not her father's, that had spoken, and the voice was the voice she had heard that night in her father's room.